Putin: No Interests for Russia in US Hacking Claim

Russian President Vladimir Putin has rejected allegations that Moscow is trying to interfere with the upcoming US presidential election through hacking.

Addressing an economic forum in the Russian capital, Moscow, on Wednesday, Putin said that nothing in the reported cyber attacks aimed primarily at the Democratic National Committee was in the interest of Russia, adding that all sides in the US presidential race were “misusing anti-Russian rhetoric” for their own objectives.

“They started this hysteria, saying that this (hacking) is in Russia’s interests. But this has nothing to do with Russia’s interests,” Putin said.

“Everyone is talking about ‘who did it’ (the hacking),” said Putin, adding, “But is it that important? The most important thing is what is inside this information.”

Earlier on Wednesday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov also dismissed the US allegations on Russia’s hacking of a range of its institutions.

“Everybody in the United States is saying that it is Russia which is running the (US) presidential election,” Lavrov said in an interview with CNN, noting, “We have not seen a single fact, a single proof.”

This came after the US government last week formally accused Russia of stealing and disclosing emails from the Democratic Party and a series of other institutions to influence the US presidential election in November.

In a joint statement on Friday, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence on Election Security and the Department of Homeland Security accused “Russia’s most-senior officials” of authorizing the act.

They said some US states had detected attempts to breach their election systems, and claimed that most of the attempts had originated from servers operated by a Russian company.

Russia worried about worsening US ties

Elsewhere in his remarks, the Russian president said Moscow was worried about the worsening of its relations with Washington.

“There is a need to behave like partners and take each other’s interests into account,” Putin said, adding, “We are ready for that.”

He, however, stressed that it was hard to hold a dialogue with the current US administration as it prefers diktat to dialogue.

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